Conventionally, a light emitting element such as an LED (which will be referred to as a “display LED” hereinafter) which emits light or causes light to flash is mounted to a card reader in, e.g., an ATM in order to urge a user to insert his/her card or clearly indicate an insertion opening. This display LED 101 is provided, e.g., upper or lower on the panel separately from a gate opening (card insertion opening) 102 of a card reader (reference numeral 103 denotes a display) as shown in FIG. 12.
However, in the above-described card reader, the display LED 101 may not be provided at the actual gate opening 102 and users may be bewildered in some cases.
Further, in the above-described card reader, in order to prevent electric parts in the display LED 101 from being short-circuited when getting wet with water or to alleviate irregularities in light emission of individual elements when the light emitting element is, e.g., an LED, a cover, which consists of a transparent or light-transparent material and to which means to diffuse the light is provided, is required as well as the light emitting element, thereby increasing the number of components.
It is, therefore, an object of the present invention to provide a card gate mechanism in a card reader that a gate opening for a card can be readily recognized by a user and the number of components such as a light emitting element can be reduced.